Demand for NewsMarket

Over 3,000 media outlets worldwide use www.thenewsmarket.com to access free b-roll footage and video news releases. The site supplies broadcasters with everything from NFL to UNICEF videos. (The organizations pay the site to post their videos.) Shoba Purushothaman, president, CEO and co-founder, discussed her Web site with B&C's Ken Kerschbaumer.

The last time we spoke, in 2002, broadcasters were just starting to get into digital delivery of content. How much progress have they made?

There is a lot more awareness of content coming in digitally because they're working with companies like BitCentral and Pathfire [both of which have IP-based delivery].

A lot of broadcasters are also taking in content via file transfer protocol [FTP]. That became popular when the conflict in Iraq broke. For companies like CNN, it suddenly became a primary way to get content back from the field.

With consumers also accessing content that way, do you think you could become a direct-to-consumer service?

Our mission has been to create the largest b-roll [inventory] possible. Companies and government organizations like UNICEF use us daily. And events like tsunami relief have us delivering content to everyone from nightly network news to local stations in Kansas City.

Has the tsunami made your site busier?

Yes.

Did you have any of the home videos from the tsunami on your site?

No, but I wish that part of our business was up and running. Our stage-two and stage-three business plans are to open the site up to freelancers and content syndicators.

And stations could sell their videos on your site.

That's one reason we decided to become a strategic partner with Hearst-Argyle. We wanted to get close to a station owner, so when that business begins to build [inventory], we can capture it.